CHAPTER XIV.
_How the Saints Were Brought to Repentance_
He put his torch to the tinder of irreligion at the first Sunday meeting after his return. There were no premonitions, no warnings, no signs.
A few of the Elders had preceded him to rejoice at the escape of the last hand-cart party from death in the mountains; and Brigham, after giving the newcomers some practical hints about their shelter during the winter now upon them, had invited Elder Rae to address the congregation.
He arose and came uncertainly forward, apparently weak, able hardly to stand without leaning upon the desk in front of him; his face waxen and drawn, hollowed at the cheeks and temples, his long hands thin to transparency. Life was betrayed in him only by the eyes. These burned darkly, far back under his brows, and flashed fiercely, as his glance darted swiftly from side to side.
At first he spoke weakly and slowly, his opening words almost inaudible, so that the throng of people before him leaned forward in sympathetic intentness, and silence became absolute in the great hall except for the high quavering of his tones. But then came a miracle of reinvigoration. Little by little his voice swelled until it was full, sonorous, richly warm and compelling, the words pouring from him with a fluency that enchained. Little by little his leaning, drooping posture of weakness became one of towering strength, the head flung back, the gestures free and potent. Little by little his burning eyes seemed to send their flash and glow through all his body, so that he became a creature of life and fire.
They heard each word now, but still they leaned forward as when he spoke at first, inaudibly--caught thrilled and breathless in his spell, even to the Elders, Priests, and Apostles sitting near him. Nor was his manner alone impressive. His words were new. He was calling them sinners and covenant-breakers, guilty of pride, covetousness, contention, lying, stealing, moral uncleanness--and launching upon them the curse of Israel"s G.o.d unless they should repent.
"It has been told you again and again," he thundered, "that if you wish to be great in the Kingdom of G.o.d you must be good. It has been told you many times, and now I burn the words once more into the bones of your soul, that in this kingdom which the great Elohim has again set up on earth, no man, no woman, can become great without being good, without being true to his integrity, faithful to his trust, full of charity and good works.
"Hear it now: if you do not order your lives to do all the good you can, if you are false to one trust, you shall be stripped naked before Jehovah of all your antic.i.p.ations of greatness. And you have failed in your work; you have been false to your trust; you have been lax and wicked, and you have temporised, nay, affiliated with Gentiles. I have asked myself if this, after all, may not have been the chief cause of G.o.d"s present wrath upon us. The flesh is weak. I have had my own hours of wrestling with Satan. We all know his cunning to take shapes that most weaken, beguile, and unman us, and small wonder if many of us succ.u.mb. But this other sin is wilful. Not only have Gentile officers, Federal officers, come among us and been let to insult, abuse, calumniate, and to trample upon our most sacred ordinances, but we have consorted, traded, and held relations with the Gentiles that pa.s.s by us.
You have the term "winter Mormons," a generation of vipers who come here, marry your daughters in the fall, rest with you during the winter, and pa.s.s on to the gold fields in the spring, never to return. You, yourselves, coined the G.o.dless phrase. But how can you utter it without crimson faces? I tell you now, G.o.d is to make a short work upon this earth. His lines are being drawn, and many of you before me will be left outside. The curtains of Zion have been spread, but you are gone beyond their folds. You are no longer numbered in the household of faith. For your weak souls the sealing keys of power have been delivered in vain.
You have become waymarks to the kingdom of folly. This is truth I tell you. It has been frozen and starved into me, but it will be burned into you. For your sins, the road between here and the Missouri River is a road between two lines of graves. For your sins, from the little band I have just brought in, one hundred and fifty faithful ones fell asleep by the wayside, and their bodies went to be gnawed by the wolves. How long shall others die for you? Forever, think you? No! Your last day is come.
Repent, confess your sins in all haste, be buried again in the waters of baptism, then cast out the Gentile, and throw off his yoke,--and thereafter walk in trembling all your days,--for your wickedness has been great."
Such was the opening gun in what became known as the "reformation." The conditions had been ripe for it, and in that very moment a fever of repentance spread through the two thousand people who had cowered under his words. Alike with the people below, the leaders about him had been fired with his spirit, and when he sat down each of them arose in turn and echoed his words, denouncing the people for their sins and exhorting them to repentance.
After another hour of this excitement, priests and people became alike demoralised, and the meeting broke up in a confusion of terror.
As the doors of the tabernacle flew open, and the Saints pushed out of that stifling atmosphere of denunciation, a cry came to the lips of the dozen that first escaped:
"To the river--the waters of baptism!"
The words were being taken up by others until the cry had run back through the crowd to the leaders, still talking in excited groups about the pulpit. These comprehended when they heard it, and straightway a line of conscience-stricken Saints was headed toward the river.
There in the icy Jordan, on that chill December afternoon, when the snows lay thick on the ground, the leaders stood and buried the sinful ones anew in the cleansing waters. From the sinners themselves came cries of self-accusation; from the crowd on the banks came the strains of hymns to fortify them for the icy ordeal and the public confession.
There in the freezing current stood Joel Rae until long after the December sun had gone below the Oquirrh hills, performing his office of baptism, and reviving hope in those his words had smitten with fear.
His strength already depleted by the long march with the hand-cart party and by the exhausting strain of the day, he was early chilled by the water into which he plunged the repentant sinners. For the last hour that he stood in the stream, his whole body was numb; he had ceased to feel life in his feet, and his arms worked with a mechanical stiffness like the arms of some automaton over which his mind had control.
For there was no numbness as yet in his mind. It was wonderfully clear and active. He had begun a great work. His words had been words of fire, and the flames of them had spread so that in a little while every sinner in Zion should burn in them and be purified. Even the leaders--a great wave of exultation surged through him at this thought--even Brigham had felt the glow, and henceforth would be a fiercer Lion of the Lord to resist the G.o.dless Gentile.
Long after sensation had left his body his thoughts were rushing in this fever of realisation, while his chilled hands made new in the Kingdom such sinners as came there repenting.
Not until night fell did the hymns cease and the crowd dwindle away. The air grew colder, and he began to feel pain again, the water cutting against his legs like a blade. Little groups were now hurrying off in the darkness, and the last Saint he had baptised was standing for the moment, chill and dripping, on the bank.
Seeing there was no one else to come, he staggered out of the stream where he had stood for three hours, finding his feet curiously clumsy and uncontrollable. Below him in the stream another Elder still waited to baptise a man and woman; but those who had been above him in the river were gone, and his own work was done.
He ascended the bank, and stood looking back at the Elder who remained in the stream. This man was now coming out of the water, having performed his office for the last one who waited. He called to Joel Rae:
"Don"t stand there, Brother Rae. Hurry and get to your fire and your warm drink and your supper, or you"ll be bed-fast with the chills."
"It has been a glorious day, Brother Maltby!"
"Truly, a great work has been begun, thanks to you--but hurry, man! you are freezing. Get to your fireside. We can"t lose you now."
With a parting word he turned and set off down the dark street, walking unsteadily through the snow, for his feet had to be tossed ahead of him, and he could not always do it accurately. And the cold, now that he was out of the water, came more keenly upon him, only it seemed to burn him through and through with a white heat. He felt his arms stiffening in his wet sleeves, and his knees grow weak. He staggered on past a row of cabins, from which the light of fires shone out on the snow. At almost every step he stumbled out of the narrow path that had been trodden.
"To your own fireside." He recalled the words of Elder Maltby, and remembered his own lone, dark cabin, himself perhaps without strength to build a fire or to get food, perhaps without even strength to reach the place, for he felt weaker now, all at once, and put his hand out to support himself against the fence.
He had been hearing footsteps behind him, creaking rapidly over the packed snow-path. He might have to ask for help to reach his home. Even as the steps came close, he felt himself swaying. He leaned over on the fence, but to his amazement that swayed, too, and threw him back. Then he felt himself falling toward the street; but the creaking steps ceased, now by his side, and he felt under him something soft but firm--something that did not sway as the fence had unaccountably done.
With his balance thus regained, he discovered the thing that held him to be a woman"s arm. A woman"s face looked close into his, and then she spoke.
"You are so cold. I knew you would be. And I waited--I wanted to do for you--let me!"
At once there came back to him the vision of a white-faced woman in the crowd along the river bank, staring at him out of deep, gray eyes under heavy, black brows.
"Mara--Mara!"
"Yes, yes--you are so cold!"
"But you must not stand so close--see, I am wet--you will be chilled!"
"But _you_ are already chilled; your clothes are freezing on you; and you were falling just now. Can you walk?"
"Yes--yes--my house is yonder."
"I know; it"s far; it"s beyond the square. You must come with me."
"But your house is still farther!"
She had started him now, with a firm grasp of his arm, walking beside him in the deep snow, and trying to keep him in the narrow path.
"No--I am staying here with Hubert Plimon"s two babies, while the mother has gone to Provo where Hubert lies sick. See--the light there.
Come with me--here"s the gate--you shall be warmed."
Slowly and with many stumblings, leaning upon her strong arm, he made his way to the cabin door. She pushed it open before him and he felt the great warm breath of the room rush out upon him. Then he was inside, swaying again uncertainly upon his feet. In the hovering light that came from the fireplace he saw the bed in the far corner where the two small children were sleeping, saw Mara with her back to the door, facing him breathlessly, saw the heavy shadows all about; but he was conscious of hardly more than the vast heavenly warmth that rolled out from the fire and enfolded him and made him drunk.
Again he would have fallen, but she steadied him down on to a wide couch covered with buffalo robes, beside the big fireplace; and here he fell at once into a stupor. She drew out the couch so that it caught more of the heat, pulled off the water-soaked boots and the stiffened coat, wrapped him in a blanket which she warmed before the fire, and covered him still again with one of the buffalo robes.
She went then to bring food and to make a hot drink, which she strengthened with brandy poured from a little silver flask.
Presently she aroused him to drink the hot liquor, and then, after another blank of stupor, she aroused him again, to eat. He could take but little of the food, but called for more of the drink, and felt the soul of it thrill along his frozen nerves until they awoke, sharpened, alert, and eager. He lay so, with closed eyes a little time, floating in an ecstasy that seemed to be half stupor and half of keenest sensibility. Then he opened his eyes. She was kneeling by the couch on which he lay. He felt her soft, quick breathing, and noted the unnatural shining of her eyes and lips where the firelight fell upon them. All at once he threw out his arms and drew her to him with such a shuddering rush of power that she cried aloud in quick alarm--but the cry was smothered under his kisses.
For ages the transport seemed to endure, the little world of his senses whirling madly through an illimitable s.p.a.ce of sensuous light, his lips melting upon hers, his neck bending in the circle of pulsing warmth that her soft arms wove about it, his own arms crushing to his breast with frenzied fervour the whole yielding splendour of her womanhood. A moment so, then he fell back upon the couch, all his body quivering under the ecstasy from her parted lips, his triumphant senses rioting insolently through the gray, cold garden of his vows.
She drew a little back, her hands resting on his shoulders, and he saw again the firelight shining in her eyes and upon her lips. Yet the eyes were now lighted with a strange, sad reluctance, even while the mutinous lips opened their inciting welcome.